Farmers in the North Fly District of Western Province need more technical support and basic equipment to improve their overall production output.
In recent years, upland rice farming had increased including vanilla, eagle wood, rubber among others.
Chairman of the Grengas Village Planning Committee (VPC), Daniel Dupe said his people were hardworking with a lot of land available to farm, but just needed help improve results.
Like other highway village farmers, he has been seeking assistance from public and private development partners and the Ok Tedi Mine to help provide expert advice and equipment.
“Most times, development partners promise us to provide equipment and financial support to boost farming but they don’t stick to their words. Too much talking and no actions were done. This has caused people in my community are not interested in farming activities. More should be done in kind rather than in cash compensation benefits.” Daniel said.
He said his people would benefit most from a rice mill, proper tools, equipment and constant technical agriculture field support.
“This is my need. We also need proper factories and other commodities grown in the district.”
Daniel said more could be done for the Community Mine Continuation Agreement (CMCA) villages in Western Province who were highly dependent on the Mine.
He said so far his family has harvested 140 kilograms of rice from their first harvest in September this year and expecting better results in the next harvest in January 2022.
Upland rice farming activities are increasing along the highway villages as well as rural catchment areas within the district which many families have been investing a lot of their time and resources into and need more technical support to complete the process.
